The view from up here

The much-talked-about View from the Shard, Europe's highest viewing platform, opens in London this February.

'Can you see France?' someone asked in the lift. The Shard is very high, but no, you cannot see France. France is more than 100 miles away. What you can see is all of London and beyond, 40 miles in every direction, all the way to hills and fields where sheep graze. Down at the foot of the Shard, hills and fields seem unthinkably far away; but up here, the silvery flats of Tottenham Marshes are tucked just behind the Barbican.

The Shard, Renzo Piano's steepled skyscraper, is the tallest building in Europe. It has 95 storeys and on the 72nd is The View at the Shard, a viewing platform and London's latest tourist attraction, opening 1 February 2013.

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On the way up there's various experiential stuff, perhaps to keep the queues entertained. Videos show you what you could see from the top if you had bionic vision; the lift appears to break through the ceilings of iconic buildings as it speeds upwards - in the blink of an eye and without so much as an ear-pop - past the Shangri-La hotel opening later this year, past the apartments that will cost £30-50million each to buy.

But the real attraction is the view. There is so much to see that you could look for hours (and you can; there's no time limit); you keep spotting new things. Landmarks like the Gherkin and St Paul's Cathedral stand out among scores of vast, historic buildings you have never noticed before. There's a military boat on the Thames three blocks long. Tower Bridge looks like Lego. Trains slide by, unhurried. Digital telescopes, tagged with information for notable locations, let you zoom in and out, and can show you how the view would look on a crystal-clear day if it's not.

Higher still, on the 75th-floor open-air observation deck where the building's glass cladding ends in spikes in the sky overhead, you can hear as well as see the city. It doesn't feel precarious, or vertigo-inducing. Instead you feel kind of disconnected from the earth, like being in a hot-air balloon, watching the world unfold below you. The distant squeal of train brakes, the wind, and the rumble and rush of the city which sounds, from up here, like the roar of the ocean.

The View from the Shard, Joiner Street, London SE1 (0844 499 7111; www.theviewfromtheshard.com). Tickets £24.95 for adults, £18.95 for children. Open daily, 9am-10pm.